A Season Of Sorrow
by chrisno1
Summary: The Blink Of An Eye - Story Two


A SEASON OF SORROW

When James Bond reached the little terraced house he was relieved to find she hadn't called the police. It was spitting with rain and he pulled his charcoal coloured over coat tight to protect his new Maurice Sedgewell suit. She'd called him a little before lunch in tears. As she talked her voice became a shrill cry and Bond told her to stay calm. He was sharp and short, authoritive. He got her to describe exactly what she had found. Anita was suddenly very lucid. She was a good girl, Bond knew it. He told her not to do anything, not to touch anything until he got there; he would be with her within the hour.

Bond didn't tell his bosses where he was going that lunchtime. He quietly slipped out of the old grey building opposite Regent's Park and strolled to Albany Road, where he parked his navy blue Triumph TR6. The six cylinder engine roared into life and he made the trip through central London and across the South Circular in less than half an hour.

The house was a on a run down street off the Addiscombe Road. Once trams had run this route and it had been considered a place for the middle classes, but they had moved out of suburbia altogether, preferring the leafy towns of the Home Counties. Now the gardens were full of garbage and overflowing black bags. The bin men were on strike again and there were piles of stinking rubbish everywhere. Another mess for Mrs Thatcher to sort out. Most of the houses were unkempt, the paintwork peeling and the curtains, if there were any, tatty and faded.

He knocked gently on the door. The girl answered it, composed, but red eyed. He held her gently and kissed her forehead, reassuring her. He took her through into the sitting room with its two functional arm chairs and a cheap coffee table. A cheap portable television was on, showing a children's programme about a bear called Paddington.

"It's been on all night," she said.

Bond nodded. The room smelt of tobacco smoke. The wallpaper was stained brown. The front windows had condensation running down them. The net curtains draped in the pools of water and were damp and mouldy at the base. There was a three bar electric fire, but Bond didn't turn it on. He got the girl to sit down and took hold of her shoulders.

She looked expectantly up at him, as if he was going to have a solution. Bond knew he didn't have one. She knew it too. "You need a cup of tea," he said.

The good old British cup of tea. Never fails, he thought. Bond went into the back rooms, where there was a spartan, unfurnished lounge and a tiny kitchen. He put on his gloves and boiled the kettle on the gas hob, using his lighter to ignite the flame. Bond didn't drink tea and he didn't make a good cup. He made it strong, was thankful there was day old milk in the larder, and put in two spoonfuls of sugar.

Bond gave the girl the steaming brew and squatted before her. Gently he stroked her arm. "Where is he, Anita?"

She started to weep again. "Upstairs. In the bathroom. Oh, God, James..."

Bond gave her his pocket handkerchief. "I'll go and have a look." He paused at the door. "Anita, you didn't touch anything, did you?"

She shook her head, but Bond wanted confirmation. "Nothing at all?" Again she shook her pretty head.

Bond went up the uncarpeted stairs. The bathroom was in front of him, its door slightly ajar. When he pushed it he found something stopped his entry. Peering around inside the doorway, Bond could see the body collapsed on the floor. Bond squeezed his way into the room.

The Russian's bulk covered all the floor space and he was lying in a confused tangle of limbs, his head cocked at a peculiar angle. His wrists were slashed and blood still oozed gently from them. His clothes were soaked. The wash basin was full of what was once water, but was now a crimson gruesome cocktail. The razor blade the Russian had used to kill himself was still sitting in the soap dish.

Bond realised he had trodden in the blood that spilled over the floor. He looked for a towel. None of them were clean, but he took one and tossed it outside onto the landing. Quickly Bond searched the dead man's trouser pockets, but only found a blood stained handkerchief. There wasn't anything he could do here.

Bond went back outside, carefully treading only on the towel. He wiped his shoes and then tossed the bloodied rag back inside the bathroom. The backroom was empty, save a few unpacked boxes. Bond peered inside them, but he couldn't see anything of any interest. Mostly they seemed to contain a collection of books and clothes. Bond took a quick look out of the upstairs window. The rear garden was a muddy pitch.

The front room contained the bed, a double with a slim mattress and grubby sheets. The blankets were pulled back. The floor didn't have carpet, but a patterned rug, homemade by the look of the design; it lay next to the bed and a pair of holey slippers sat on it. There was a desk in the room, littered with various nick-nacks. The unconnected assortment included a comb, a bottle of cologne, a packet of Silk Cut cigarettes, an unemptied ashtray, a half empty litre bottle of vodka, a glass, more books, an alarm clock, pens, sheaves of paper, a copy of _Playboy_ and a heavy hard back version of _Das Kapital._ Bond smiled at the irony of it. He opened the front cover. It was borrowed from Croydon library. It was overdue.

Bond turned to the scrunched up papers. They were covered in tiny writing. Bond recognised the cyrillic alphabet. Some of the pages would be hard to decipher as they were tear stained. Bond carefully picked up the pages of writing and folded them into half. He placed them in his over coat pocket, the deep one inside the lining.

Bond went back downstairs. The girl was sitting, tense. She looked up at him with that same expectant expression, as if she thought Bond could solve the problem. He shook his head.

"This is bad, Anita," he announced, "I'll have to call in the firm. I warned you not to come here."

"It isn't fair, James. Why did I have to leave him?"

"It was orders, Anita. That's what we get paid to do."

She swore. An unladylike choice of words, thought Bond. And then she swore at him, calling him several names, claiming it was all his fault, that he didn't have to do everything the bastards told him. Bond didn't flinch.

There wasn't a telephone in the house, so Bond went out to his car and opened the glove compartment, where he kept an emergency two way radio. He called in to the main desk and gave the day's pass word. In a minute he was speaking to the Chief of Staff and explaining, in a series of codes, what he'd found. He was advised to get out of there fast. They would call the emergency services anonymously, but it wouldn't do to have Bond and the girl there when the police arrived.

Bond understood and went straight back indoors. "Come on, Anita, I'm taking you home. We can't stay here."

She nodded. She did understand. Bond asked again if she had touched anything. She shook her head, holding up the mug of tea in one hand and a pair of ladies gloves in the other. Bond gave a little smile. Even now, despite her disposition, she was still professional. But he wondered for how much longer.

They left the house, the girl taking the mug with her. Bond drove them fast through the traffic to the girl's house share in Hanworth, near the airport. He stayed with her, consoling her and talking to her as she shared some of her memories of the Russian. There were a lot of tears and a lot of shouting. Towards the evening, Bond boiled some potatoes and they ate them mashed, with a tin of pilchards and thick slices of bread.

Later on, when the girl had stopped crying, she played with Bond's hair and kissed him, apologised and thanked him. They made love, but it was a sorrowful affair, born out of desperation on her part and ambivalence on Bond's.

When Bond left her it was almost midnight. She was sleeping soundly. Back in his own flat, just off the Kings Road, Bond looked at the pages of writing he'd taken from the Russian's house. Bond didn't understand cyrillic, but he would be interested to find out what the translators made of them.

*************************

Bond got the papers down to the translator's department himself, wanting to keep their existence secret. He approached a bored looking clerk and sat down in front of his desk. Bond wasn't about to pull any kind of rank; he was still only a Special Operative after all. But he made it quite clear he didn't want any one to know about the papers.

The man fiddled with his pencil. "What's in it for me, chum?"

"What do you want? I can slip you a few if that's what you'd like."

He sniffed. "Get me two stall seats at Covent Garden. Domingo's doing Traviata next month. My wife's a big fan."

"Christ, that'll set me back."

The man shrugged and handed back the papers. "I heard you can afford it out of your winnings from the Claremont."

Bond shook his head ruefully. "Okay, okay, I'll get the tickets."

"It'll be done by tomorrow. I'll take it home. Just get me the tickets, chum."

Bond had to wait three days to get the translated copies. It took him that long to find the opera tickets; they were like gold dust. The copies arrived in the internal post the same afternoon. Bond didn't have an office of his own; he shared with five other operatives, all of whom were hoping to achieve the elite status of a double "O" number, the Holy Grail of British espionage. Most of them had seen active service in the military or the armed divisions of the police and their qualities had been identified by observers who forwarded their recommendations to the Secret Intelligence Service. Bond hid the papers from any prying eyes.

Some of the boys tried to tempt him out for a drink, but he said he wanted to do some gemming up on Russian firearms, so they left him alone. It was six o'clock in the evening when Bond sat back in his chair, lit one of his Morland's and took a swig from a flask of Danty XO he kept in the bottom drawer of his desk. He took out the slim file of papers and turned to page one of the translations. He started to read:

"My name is Nikolay Volkov. I have been betrayed. Betrayed by Great Britain, this heartless, bleak country I find myself in. Betrayed by the secret services. Betrayed by the woman I love. But, worst, I have betrayed my own fatherland, my own people and my own family, my wife and my beautiful children. Before my life ends, I have to tell you why.

"I was born on a hot summer's day in late July 1938, such a hot day that my mother fainted from exhaustion. We lived in Novosibirsk, the biggest city in Siberia, a town that owes its existence to the Trans-Siberian railway. My grandfather helped to build it and was later given a post at Glavny Station. We lived with him in a two bedroom flat close to the railway line and the trains used to rattle past every minute of every day. We were Jews, but we didn't practice. I never saw my father go to the synagogue. Mother never encouraged me to go. It wasn't like that in Soviet Russia.

"My father was already in the Red Army, a corporal, and before I was one year old he was fighting the Finns, far to the West. I only saw him for a few short months, before he was called back to fight the Great Patriotic War. He was a tall, strong man, with happy eyes and he would tell me folk tales as I lay in my bunk. When he came back five years later he looked old and tired and his eyes didn't shine. He never spoke about the war; just occasionally he would mention some horror or a moment of peace among the fury. He was a broken man and after providing me with three little sisters, he suffered a heart attack and was invalided. Mother tended to his needs and raised us all and still worked in the upholstery factory. Grandfather used to help in the house, but he was so old. I think it was a relief to her when they both the men died.

"I didn't warm to my mother. She was a peasant woman, hard working and unfussy. She wasn't any great beauty; her hands were like big chunks of meat. Yet there was a delicacy to her which allowed her to stitch and sew and embroider. I think that was her only escape. The only time she could be herself. She understood the need for education and after the war I was sent to the Staliniski School. I was two years behind the others, but I wanted to learn and I learnt fast. For a time, because of my size, the teachers wanted to add me to the ranks of athletes, a wrestler or boxer, but I resisted, a foolish thing to do, insisting I had a brain as well as brawn. They only believed me when they saw my test results.

"The city was growing faster now and at sixteen I joined the workers on the building sites constructing big new blocks of housing for all the comrades who poured into the city. It was a clever choice as my family was allowed to be rehoused into one of the new flats. I think it was the last time I saw my mother smile. Of course, you had to join the Party and I became a komsomol. I saw all the possibilities. It was a good opportunity and I took to it with some zeal. I enjoyed those early formative years. But I was restless. I still wanted to learn and I wanted to move away from the stinking city with its million inhabitants segregated by the criss-crossing railway lines.

"Of course I had to do my three years of National Service. The Siberian Military Division was based outside Novosibirsk, so my initial training was very local. Later I was posted as a Platoon Captain with the 73rd Khakassia Rifle Division and I completed my formal education in the army. There was a lot of informal education too and I learnt to drink, smoke, fight and womanise in the army. We were based outside the old fortress city of Tyumen. The nights in the beautiful old town, its picturesque buildings and its stylish bars felt a million miles away from my Novosibirsk.

"Things were changing now. Stalin, Our Great Father, had died and the horrors of his reign became apparent. They sent so many to the Gulags, the camps, the prisons and the execution chambers. Perhaps twenty five million. As a child I never knew. People, whole families, would just disappear. And that is what everyone told us. They just disappeared. You didn't talk about it.

"I saw in Khrushchev the chance for change and I wanted to be part of it. I thought I could change things too. So, when I left the army, I began working in local government, as a treasurer, allocating the Party Funds. It was a good job. People looked up to me, despite my young age. Even then I started to notice that there was fear in their faces.

"At twenty two I was sent to officiate the Akademgorodok, a huge purpose built facility for scientists, where they lived and worked, never far from the institute. Nestled in the taiga forest and stretching along the banks of the Ob Sea, the Akademy was the most peaceful of places. At last I began to see nature. I talked to the professors there. I began to learn of art and writing and music. The professors were not very discreet and frequently talked of Western scholars. An unspeakable thing in my Soviet Union! But, fascinated, I would let them talk.

"I married in1960. Not for love. Yelena was a pretty girl, from a nice family. One warm evening we lay down together and she became pregnant. We both knew we should marry. She was only sixteen. Four weeks later it was done, at the local ZAG office. Her father got very drunk. I fought her brother and beat him. A typical Russian wedding. We have five children now. Yelena is a good mother. But I do not love her. If I ever did love her it was in that first year of wedded bliss, making a home for ourselves and our son Gregory, who we named after my father.

"I was restless within a year. It had been the coldest of cold winters. Minus thirty and snow so deep you couldn't see over it. Our little boy suffered terribly and we sat his crib next to the stove all the days and nights. I couldn't stay in this place. The Akademy was worse than the city during the winters. I went back to the party officials. Was there anything I could do? Something suitable for my talents, I asked. Again and again I asked. Then someone said they knew of a man, an official in the Ukraine who, having discussed my talents, wanted to see me. I made the six day journey West through Omsk and Ufa and then further South to Samara and a stop in the new Volgograd. I had never seen such progress. Everywhere buildings were being erected, streets paved, factories and shipping warehouses teemed with life. And to think only fifteen years before this city had been razed. At last I saw the Soviet miracle. It made me proud to be a citizen and comrade. I was humbled by the Pantheon and overcome by the sight of Mother Russia wielding her sword. When I finally arrived in Donetsk, I was full of patriotic zeal, something which had never inhabited me before.

"Sergei Yaroslav was in charge of economic reform in the territory and he wanted a strong right hand, someone to manage the administrators, accountants and auditors. Of course, I accepted. This was a magnificent opportunity, especially for someone so young and without university certificates. Poor Yelena was not happy. She didn't want to join me; her home was the low hills of the Ob Valley, she said, why would she want to live with the grain farmers of the Ukraine? In the end I didn't give her a choice. If we had any love left, it vanished soon after.

"We settled into a three room apartment that hardly did justice to my position. But it was in a managed block, quiet and we had special privileges. I never returned to Novosibirsk. I never saw my sisters again. My mother died some years ago, but she was lost to me before then.

"If I had known what Yaroslav required of me I would never have taken the post. Khrushchev had tried to change things, to launch reforms and decentralise the economy. But you couldn't break the one party state, the authoritarian rule, the central plans and the perverse social control. We didn't have widespread purges anymore, but people still feared the unexpected knock on the door and any demonstration of dissent was ruthlessly put down. I discovered that this was the role Secretary Yaroslav envisaged for me. Unfortunately I could not turn the post down. If I had refused it now I would lose much face. I had also passed on the apartment at the Akademy. Yelena and I would have been destitute. So, reluctantly, I went to work.

"I found myself looking at paperwork for clues of misdemeanours and corruption. I read reports from informers at factories and in the collectives. I contacted the secret police. It was not pleasant work, but as I never had to carry out the orders I provided, I tried not to dwell on the consequences. The Comrade's Courts were closed and we suppressed the publication of samizdat. No newsletters, no books, no literature at all, unless it was approved by the Party.

"The worst of the story is how the Party machine itself was breaking. Even in the days after Khrushchev, when they re-instated social and political control, it was a corrupt and self serving government. Nationally and internationally we appeared powerful, regulated and infallible. But lower down the ladder of officialdom, we became rotten, a mire of bribery, lies, slander and entrapment. And I was playing my part.

"You can't do this kind of work and not be noticed. I hoped to be promoted. Yaroslav had got drunk one time too many and was run over by a tram right outside the house of his mistress. A very messy affair that I had to clear up with the minimum of fuss. When the committee over looked me for Yaroslav's position, I searched for another way out.

"In 1967 Yuri Andropov became the head of the KGB. I was exactly the sort of comrade he needed to help form the Fifth Directorate. We were charged with suppressing all dissent – political, nationalist, cultural and religious. We effectively nullified opposition at home and abroad quickly and efficiently. But it wasn't blind repression. We received accurate reports from the territories, the Soviet bloc and from our embassy staff and international sympathisers. We anticipated the cracks in Poland long before the West saw their public manifestations. We didn't trust Brezhnev and his cohorts, many of whom, like his daughter Galina, we knew to be pilfering millions of roubles. We turned a blind eye until they ceased to serve any useful purpose.

"Andropov was better informed than the President about the Western powers. He approved of Kosygin's ideas to forge ties with the West, at least to obtain their technology: it was Andropov who supported the Apollo-Soyuz space mission in 1975. He recognised our military machine was becoming a burden on the economy. It cost millions to continue our nuclear defence program while the quality of our armed forces was still open to question. Ten years later in Afghanistan his fears were proved correct.

"We had entered the period of detente. Life was good for me and Yelena. Good, but not happy. We had moved to Kiev, to a big apartment on Sofiivska and had a dacha on the Black Sea coast in the Crimea, with all the other party leaders. The conditions of detente were supposed to help us spread the ethics of communism. But we started to look inwards instead. Outside we only saw a strong, imperialist West.

"I made my first trip outside of the USSR in 1973, to Finland, for the European Security Conference. Not, you understand to negotiate, but rather to observe, to spy on our own representatives. Andropov was terrified someone would defect. Several people did as a result of that conference – but not immediately. For myself, I was intrigued. Life in the Soviet Union was always a struggle. We were comfortable and the children were educated well. But everyone wore the same drab clothes. We all cut our hair the same way. We listened to the same music. We read the same books. It was stifling. And I was guaranteeing this oppressive atmosphere continued.

"I was promoted in 1977: another new apartment and the title First Commissar, Ukraine Authority, 5th Directorate of the Committee for State Security. Yelena gave birth to our last child, my fourth daughter. Personal relations between us ceased soon after and, like others in my position, I sought the services of the secretaries, the impressionable young things and the prostitutes, especially at weekends in the Crimea, which became my home from home.

"But I wasn't satisfied. I had a better life than most of my countrymen, but I was hollow inside. I wasn't fulfilled. Banishing political riff-raff didn't thrill me. I wasn't excited by reform. It was my son, Gregory, who changed it all for me. A keen teenage sportsman, he had narrowly failed to join Dynamo as an apprentice. Disgruntled he asked if I could exile the coach. It was said in jest and he was happy to begin a career as a physical education teacher. A year or so later I met Oleg Ochenko, the head of football development in the Ukraine. Dynamo Kiev were the Champions of Russia and as such had gained entry to the European club competitions. Ochenko approached me, worried about the potential loss of his star players. Not just as defectors, but as genuine purchases for overseas clubs. I told him of my sons joke and after some consideration, Ochenko offered me a deal. My son could join Dynamo as a fitness coach, if I could guarantee none of the players ever went abroad.

"It didn't take me long to decide. Ochenko was good enough to offer me some sweeteners also. Free tickets. Hospitality. Travel to support the team. Despite never being interested in football, I took the opportunity, because I wanted to see more of the world far beyond my windows.

"My taste for foreign travel was noticed, but it wasn't frowned upon, as on my return I always presented a report from the Soviet Embassy or from an informant I had arranged to meet. I found it easy to leave the playing staff, to enjoy a glass of beer in a small cafe, or a meal in a fine restaurant. I began to learn English and French to help me to communicate with the waiters and the women who were intrigued by the tall man from Mother Russia.

"I still had a career with the KGB. In 1979 I attended the negotiations for SALT II, a treaty to limit arms production. Politically, it wasn't successful. The West was already suspicious of our involvement in the recent fall of some moderate regimes. Vietnam, Mozambique, Angola, Ethiopia and Yemen all switched to radical left wing government. The fall of the Shar of Iran was perhaps the final straw for the NATO powers and by the end of the year, long range missiles were deployed in Europe.

"Underneath this sudden tension, I was in a state of flux. I had met a wonderful person in Vienna. She was not a Russian. In addition to the high level military discussions, there were a number of gatherings, small parties and banquets. I was introduced to Anita Brookfield by a British attaché. She spoke Russian, so he thought we could have a proper conversation. She was a very good Russian speaker, but in the White Russian fashion. I didn't tell her, as it was charming to hear some of the old phrases and accents again. Her mother's family name was Rostov and they came from Leningrad – she still called it Petrograd – escaping during the Civil War, sailing first to Sweden and then to Britain. I had never met an exile. She was nothing how I expected. There was no bitterness and no hatred. I almost felt she was sorry for her forebears having caused so many problems. It was hardly her fault. She was a slip of a girl, only in her early twenties.

"I wasn't supposed to fraternise with foreigners, but she was attentive, pleasant and flirtatious. I had never had a proper friendship with a woman; perhaps with my wife, at the start, but certainly not in the last twenty years. It was a revelation. It was fresh. Suddenly, the work, the Party, didn't seem quite so important. Not in the beautiful city of the Hapsburgs. I was only interested in this beautiful girl whose family memories seemed much clearer and better than my own. It wasn't hard to slip away from my own minders. We made love, hurried, passionate love in a small hotel.

"Foolishly I took her details. I could send articles abroad without having my post subjected to scrutiny. And I sent her love letters. She sent letters back, via the Soviet Embassy. Her words were soft and comforting. I managed to find an excuse to visit Vienna again in the fall and she was there, waiting for me, in her little apartment opposite Stadtpark. We shared three days of heady love. What was I doing? A First Commissar is falling in love with a silly little English girl! Don't be an idiot, I told myself. But it was too late for thinking. I couldn't get a posting abroad anymore, my profile was too high, but I could travel with the football team. Perhaps, I suggested, she could travel to the same cities.

"It was the most ridiculous idea. But I knew it would work. The blind spots in people's judgement that had so infuriated me when I was young became my ally. When people are already afraid of you, they don't question where you go or what you do. There were assignations in Turkey, Ostrava, Vienna again and twice in Sophia – each one a further revelation of our love. Yes, I say love. A mad passion. An aching, beautiful desire. It was like nothing I had experienced before or since. My heart still aches. But now it is more painful. There is much regret and much hurt. Eventually someone has to question your movements and it could only be your own flesh and blood, your only son.

"When Gregory confronted me, I could not lie. I saw the distaste on his mouth and heard the hate of his words. But I also saw the fear in his eyes. I was after all a First Commissar of the KGB. There is not much argument with me. I told him, honestly, bleakly, that I no longer and had hardly ever loved his mother. But I meant no harm to her, to him or his sisters. Would he rather I embarrass them all in Kiev with one of the loose women from Batyieva Hill? No, of course he wouldn't. He had to be sensible. Be silent. I wasn't asking him. It was an order. And Gregory knew that and now I just saw disbelief and hurt on his face.

"It didn't stop me. I became even more determined. Now my son was lost to me, it seemed even more important to sustain the last happiness I had. My letters became more desperate, more frustrated. I sensed in her replies a similar longing. The Soviet Union was on the verge of change. Brezhnev had suffered a stroke; we all knew it, even if Pravda denied it. He wouldn't live for much longer. I knew that Andropov was going to resign from the KGB, so he could strengthen his position in the Politburo. He had aims on becoming General Secretary, head of state in all but name. After I left, he was elected. Had he lived, maybe there would be more hope for my people. He'd only one year to change things; we at the Directorate knew he needed ten.

"All the political intrigues, the sackings and the reshuffles, the aligning of support, were distractions for others. It allowed me to go about my private business unsolicited. In April I concocted an excuse to visit the Embassy in Vienna. I met Anita in the Prata Park. We walked and talked and ate in a little cafe. We watched an old French film about love and wartime memories in Japan.

"Later, as we ate dinner, Anita reminded me of that lonely actress watching her lover but not daring to speak to him, to approach him, to tell him how she felt. In the morning, just like the actress, she told me the truth. And when she told me, all the happiness I had in me vanished. Her posting was at an end. She was returning to England. She couldn't meet me anymore. It would be too complicated in London, too dangerous for us.

"It wasn't enough. I told her that. I needed her. I wanted her. I loved her. Her joy was both a pleasure and a relief. Did she love me too? Yes, of course she did. I would come to her. I promised it. I would defect.

"Madness. Forty years as a communist. To throw it all away. She begged me to reconsider it. My family, she said. My wife. My position. It was too dangerous. Hadn't I told her we still executed dissidents? Hunted down and assassinated defectors? It wasn't an argument she was going to win. I told her I would find her in England. She was angry. No woman had ever been angry with me and I didn't know how to react. What did I think I was going to do? Jump on a plane, she said, walk over the border, she said. Something like that, I said. Did I think it would be that easy? Hadn't all those years with the KGB taught me anything? Didn't I realise they knew everything about everybody?

"I did know that. But I also knew there was information we didn't retain, people who were not observed, details known only to a few, discussed only face to face. The highest of security levels: the aural committees. Of course I couldn't be certain, but I didn't think I was discussed at these undocumented meetings; I had recently been invited to attend some in Moscow, a sure sign I was regarded as trustworthy. I would create an opportunity. The leaders at home were preoccupied with an internal power struggle. It was a perfect moment.

"Anita didn't believe me. I saw sadness in her eyes. She was afraid, she said, because she didn't know what would happen to us in England. The authorities. The public. Her own family. She loved him so much, but there was no-one to trust, no-one who would understand what was inside her heart. I said: there was me.

"I left her sad and in tears. I think she was heartbroken. But I could mend what was broken. I didn't cry. It was time to be strong and decisive. I thought of all those people I had signed into exile, condemned to prison. There was no escape for them. But there would be one for me.

"I had never enjoyed the company of Oleg Ochenko, but at last I had a real use for him. The USSR had qualified for the football World Cup, which was to be held in Spain. Oleg, I wondered, would there be any tickets available for the First Commissar? Of course there would! The early games were held in Seville and Malaga, but if we qualified, the second stage of games would be played in Barcelona at the end of June. Would a few days on La Rambla be acceptable? I agreed it would.

"The team duly succeeded. Leaving my family, my girls, my wife, was not the easiest of days. I did nothing different from my other journeys. Yelena had found my sudden interest in football mildly amusing. I think she was glad to be rid of me for a few days. The girls used to be upset, but not so much now. They were mostly grown up and pretty, like their mother. It was only the youngest, Arina, who wanted a hug and a kiss. I stroked her golden hair for the last time on 30th June 1982. It was my last contact with my family, but it meant little.

"I spent an anxious day travelling to Berlin and then onto Barcelona. I had all the diplomatic clearance I needed, but I could see the officials at both the airports inspecting my visa closely. Was this really Nikolay Volkov? And travelling alone? There was a dismissive shrug. I expect a button had been pressed somewhere. I joined the team at their hotel, a functional building outside the city. It looked as if it had been uprooted from the Soviet Union and replanted in Catalonia.

"We won the game against Belgium, but I was too on edge to think of the result. There would be some celebrating in the hotel that night. Even these professionals enjoyed a glass or two of vodka. It didn't bother me. I can hold my drink. The party was dying by midnight, only the executives were left and I made my excuses and retired. The hotel was a good distance from the city centre, but I had studied the maps and the road routes very carefully. I washed and changed.

"It was hot that July night when I walked past the dozy night porter and made my slow journey those six miles to the Avda Diagonal. I passed all manner of strangers, cavorting, drinking, and singing. It was as much of an awakening as the train journey I had made all those years ago from Siberia to Donetsk. I sat for thirty minutes in a little cafe on the corner of Calle de Buenos Aires. I thought about my children, even the son who hated me and the wife who had borne them all. I thought of my pledge to the Party, to the State and to the Directorate. It didn't matter any more. There was a beautiful woman waiting for me. A woman who wanted me as much as I wanted her.

"I walked over the road and entered the British Consulate. I introduced myself to a startled receptionist and explained I was hoping to defect. I think she thought I was joking. I was asked to wait one moment. A smart, slightly flustered individual wearing a suit, but no tie, came to see me and ushered me into his stuffy office. He didn't seem to take me seriously either. But I insisted he spoke to the Embassy in Madrid. I explained he needed to contact them immediately. The Russian contingent would be rousing at eight-thirty and if I wasn't found missing they would alert their own authorities as well as the local police.

"He finally took me seriously enough to make one phone call. I was asked to confirm my date of birth and my position in the Committee for State Security. It was like a bomb had gone off. There was a sudden flurry of activity everywhere. I was in Madrid by noon. I was on a diplomatic flight to London before the day had passed.

"And then the worst of it came. The drugs to make me sleep. The little white padded room. The suspicion. The disbelief. The doctors and the nurses. The endless tests. I was photographed, finger printed, blood samples, voice printed, teeth, eyes, height, size, shape, body markings, a full medical, heart, lungs, liver, urine. My clothes were taken away. I never saw them again. My passport was confiscated. I never saw that either. Even criminals have better treatment, I supposed. Except I knew in my country they probably hadn't.

"Then at last, I was presented to a grey haired old man, a very short tempered man, who wore a very well cut suit which stank of cheap pipe tobacco. He didn't tell me his name. He said he was from the British Secret Intelligence Service. He wanted to know why the Russians had not admitted to my defection or at the very least to my disappearance. No announcement. Nothing in the traffic they intercepted. No rumour even. He thought I was a plant. Someone sent to provide a host of misleading information. It was the middle of the Falkland Crisis. Did the Russians really think the British were so stupid? I was asked. I didn't hesitate. I told him the truth from the very beginning. I told him of my love for Anita Brookfield. I told him there was no politics involved. It was a matter of the heart. He was astonished.

"Whether he believed me or not, I do not know. I never saw the man again. The next weeks passed in a blur, each one blending into another. For day after day, hour after hour, I was taken to a big room, with recording equipment, lie detectors, heart monitors, and cameras. I was introduced to three men who called themselves Smith, Jones and Baker. They asked me questions. Questions about everything. About my life, my family, my friends, my enemies, my work. Especially about my work. They wanted names, dates, places and times. I told them everything I could remember. And after I finished a lifetime of memories, they asked me again. And then again. Different questions, to see if I gave different answers, but I had told them everything I knew.

"Towards the end, almost as an after thought, one of them asked why I liked Anita. I said she reminded me of the actress in _Hiroshima Mon Amour,_ lost and afraid, searching for someone to love her. But I wasn't describing her; I was describing me.

"They finally let me see the sunlight after that. It was so bright I thought I was going to faint with shock. I sat for a long time on a bench watching some ducks paddle across a pond. I did not know, I still do not know, where I was. I was well cared for and had good meals and everything you needed to live. But I only had myself for company. At night I could think of Anita and I would be happy. Sometimes I remembered the feel of my daughter's golden hair and I was sickened by my own selfishness and pride.

"Eventually another two men came to see me, both very formal and polite. They had new clothes and new documents. They carried with them a big folder full of the life history of a man called Brian Greene. They spent four days explaining to me where I was going to live and what I should do. I had contact numbers. I would be monitored. I would be sufficiently paid. They appreciated my accent was something of a problem, but they had reproduced a life story similar to my own. Only Brian Greene had been born in a place called Cumbria and served in the military, the pensions department, for twenty years. He had retired from the army through ill health and bought a little flat in Goring-on-Sea. I didn't have a choice. I had to become Brian Greene.

"I saw my little keepers every day. Mr and Mrs Platt. I knew they were the ones responsible for me, because they introduced themselves, bringing a bottle of disgustingly sweet wine. It was a solitary life. It wasn't what I came to England for. To be shoved aside and kept hidden. To be given something that only resembled a life. The money ran out so fast. I hadn't ever learnt to cook and I learnt I was a bad cook and a poor shopper. I learnt to buy things everyday, because if I didn't it would go mouldy. And the drink was so expensive I couldn't even drink myself to sleep.

"And then one day she appeared. I saw her from the window. I stood there so still. I didn't want to move in case she disappeared. She didn't disappear. She came right to the door and rang the bell. And when we stood face to face it was as if all the months of waiting had been worth it. She looked fresh and exciting. I was shamed by my shirt and trousers. It wasn't the suits and uniforms she had been used to seeing me in. I had also taken to growing a beard. But she stroked it with her hand and when she kissed me she murmured that I tickled, that it was nice. And then I held her so close and so tight.

"Anita! My Anita! But I sensed her holding back. She was crying already and had her little handkerchief out. She had something to tell me. That was why she was here. She hadn't expected me to come. She really hadn't. We sat down. Was she happy? Yes, it was wonderful I had come, but it was also a mistake. What was I thinking of? Why was I here? Did I not know what the Russians had written about me?

"I didn't understand. And then she told me. I was a dead man. The Russian authorities had announced my death and I was buried in the Army Cemetery outside Novosibirsk. A small ceremony attended by my family. I did understand; I had authorised many such ceremonies; it meant I was free; they didn't care where I was or what I did. It meant we could be together.

"She shook her head. No, the S.I.S. couldn't agree to that. She wanted it so much, she said, she desperately wanted to be with me. But it couldn't happen. It wasn't supposed to happen like this. Had I not realised what was happening? Surely I knew their movements were observed from the outset? The attaché who introduced us? The photographers in the cafes? The little Fiat outside her apartment? Was I so blind? Was I so foolish? And yet she too had fallen in love. And she had tried to stop me coming, told me I mustn't defect, mustn't leave my family. She knew what would happen if I came. Hadn't she told me that last night in Vienna – "Don't come. Please."

"I couldn't speak. I was dumb struck. Whatever else she said to me was like water to a duck. All my life I had looked at reports that I believed to be true and adjudged the guilt or innocence of individuals on the strength of the written and the spoken word; now here some one was speaking to me, but I could not digest the information. It was as if it no longer mattered. And if it did, it was my turn to suffer, not those under scrutiny.

"The pain when she left was too huge. Was there any hope? No, there was someone else. I saw him, a very good looking young man, driving a small dark blue sports car. I watched them leave from my window and he gave me a long hard look, one that sent a shiver down my spine, not because it frightened me, but because I knew I had lost her.

"Goring-on-Sea isn't the place for a retired army major. I made for the city in a few weeks, carefully selling the possessions in the house day after day. I still had Brian Greene's bank account. At the last moment I withdrew everything in it and journeyed to London. I stopped at East Croydon. I rented a house, from an old Jewish man who wanted to pay someone, a strong man, to collect rent from his other properties. For once I didn't have to worry about being Jewish.

"The S.I.S. must walk with their eyes closed. I wasn't hiding; perhaps the best form of camouflage is normality. Eventually I found her, using the telephone directory, the public records, asking questions in cafes and bars. I watched her for three weeks. Watched the other girl she lived with come and go. Eventually she left on her own one morning and I followed her to Feltham station. Her trip to work was a long one, past places called Barnes, Putney, Wandsworth, finally Victoria and then a slow tube ride. I accosted her on Regent's Park tube station, just before the escalator. It was as if she had seen a ghost. And then she held me close, crying, melting into my arms.

"It doesn't matter what we said, sitting on the platform, on the old brick benches. I told her I loved her and I would always love her. She told me she would never love anyone how she had loved me. We both believed it. We kissed and we wiped a few tears from each other's faces. She whispered "I'm so sorry, Niky, can you forgive me." Of course I could. I said she would always be with me, where ever I was, until I died.

"I don't know if Anita understood what I said. Perhaps she did. Perhaps she just wants me to disappear like everyone else. The British don't need me anymore. The Russians have killed me already. My family and my wife have lost me. My son hates me. It is time to disappear, like all those names that vanished after the stroke of my pen.

"Nikolay Volkov, First Commissar, Ukraine Authority, 5th Directorate of the Committee for State Security."

The original papers had been dated and signed. Bond put the last page down on his desk. It was more than dark outside. His desk lamp provided a sole shaft of white in the dull office, illuminated only by the yellow street lights that penetrated the thick windows, net curtains and day old smoke. He'd been reading a long time.

Bond took another hefty slug form his hip flask. He lit his fortieth cigarette of the day. The match flickered before him. Bond watched it burn, almost to his fingers and then dropped it onto the corner of the document where it smouldered and started to take hold, tiny flames flickering in front of him.

Quickly Bond swept the little pile of burning paper into his waste basket, originals and copies together. He watched it burn. As he watched, he smoked calmly, without any compassion, and when it was done he found a bin liner and poured the whole smouldering contents into it. On his way home, Bond disposed of the bin liner in a public litter bin somewhere close to South Kensington tube station.

************************

Bond remembered on that short drive home the first curious conversation he'd had with Tom Colthorpe, the Chief of Staff.

"Look, James, you're a good looking lad. And that's what we need. It's what this lass needs."

Colthorpe was very much of the old school. To him, thought Bond, girls were girls and men were men. Women, frankly, didn't exist unless they were married with children. Bond secretly wondered if Mrs Colthorpe felt the same way. He had an image of the man removing his shoes before he'd even set through the door in case he sullied the carpets.

"We're not expecting you to fall in love or make her forget Volkov that would be ridiculous. She's been totally upfront with us about the whole affair. The girl got emotionally involved. So, she may have got a few tit-bits of information, but frankly that's not the point. We had to pull her out of there. She knew it was getting too bloody serious; both for her and for him. And now Volkov's talking about defecting. It's a bloody mess," Colthorpe paused; the moment of silence seemed to curtail the explanation, "M thinks there might be some mileage in setting her up with some dates. You know take her dancing, the theatre, a few drinks, that sort of thing"

That sort of thing, mused Bond. Colthorpe didn't have much of an understanding of modern courting rituals. He gave a diplomatic shrug. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt. As I understand it, she's quite a pretty sort. I don't suppose the service is offering to advance a few expenses my way? For the duration."

Colthorpe looked visibly shocked. "Certainly not, Bond. We're not the Bank of bloody England. You can submit them every second week like everyone else."

Bond stood up to and said his thanks. As he opened the office door, Colthorpe cleared his throat and Bond hesitated. "Mark them for my attention only," said the Chief of Staff, "We don't want anyone to think you're getting special privilege, do we? Before your promotion, I mean."

"No, sir."

Bond's heartbeat almost skipped. Canny old devil, he thought. Well, if seducing a pretty little secretary was going to help him get his stripes, so be it.

Anita Brookfield wasn't hard to find. Bond merely made a few gentle enquiries in the canteen to have her pointed out to him. She was certainly a pretty girl; blonde, slim, with a European taste in fashion and an American taste in big bouffant hair. But he considered her smile a trifle sad.

After a few days he engaged her in conversation in the lift and later on over lunch. Bond already had something of a reputation with the ladies and she was well aware of it. But persistence sometimes pays dividends. She agreed to a solitary drink. And a week later she agreed to the ballet. That weekend they went to Ronnie Scott's. Soon they were the talk of the dreaded powder vine. Bond wasn't particularly bothered. She was good company. He found her intelligent and fun, without being totally exuberant. She didn't discuss her personal life much, although Bond learnt a lot about her family history, a subject she seemed particularly proud of. She asked a lot of questions and empathised with his difficult childhood, the loss of his parents and the difficult education. One Saturday night after a close dance at Annabel's, she kissed him so softly Bond felt her lips tremble.

Anita taught him some Russian phrases and they greeted each other with foreign hellos and how are yous. One day Bond told her, in Russian, that he loved her. He didn't mean it; he just thought it was what she wanted to hear. It was certainly what his superiors wanted him to say. They made love that evening and Bond was pleasantly surprised by her skill and suppleness.

And then word got to her about Nikolay Volkov. How she found out hardly seemed relevant. She found out. Bond tried to deflect her questions. Sometimes he didn't have the answers. The Russian had already been in the country for six months and it took another three for her to track him down. How she did it, Bond didn't know. He guessed she used similar bribes to the ones he often pulled. Her looks were certainly promising enough.

She persuaded him to drive her down to Goring-on-Sea, a town Bond considered a place for the retired and infirm. The two lovers spent an hour together. Bond waited patiently outside. When Anita returned, she was crying uncontrollably. Bond glanced up at the third floor to see a big, bearded face looking wistfully down. Bond thought the Russian was crying too.

Bond told her about the meeting with Colthorpe. It didn't go down very well. But he told her she was a diamond girl and that he really loved her, it just hadn't started how he would have wanted it. Was he forgiven? She merely said there seemed to be a lot of guilt and forgiveness in the world at the moment. For the first time she told him everything of the affair with the Russian.

Bond and Anita saw less of each other over the next few weeks. The passion that had grown dissipated and they settled into a gentle friendship, sharing words and the occasional drink. It was all very civil. Colthorpe seemed very happy.

And then she had been late to work and she was never late. She'd made this difficult request to Bond and he'd objected. But she had persuaded him; that the Russian was going to do something terrible, but she didn't know how or when. She couldn't let it happen. She would do anything.

There wasn't anything Bond wanted, but he said he would look up the name of this Jewish landlord. There might be a list of his properties somewhere. He got her the list by the end of the day. Anita kissed him her thanks. Bond said if she got in any trouble, she must call him.

She certainly found trouble, thought Bond, changing gear as he slowed along the King's Road. The rest of the story was recent history.

*************************

Croydon Crematorium lies in the suburbs of South London, just East of Mitcham Common. An assembly of fifty or so stood silently in the rain. Family people mostly, or old acquaintances. Some had known her long ago and remembered her with fondness; others had been with her to the end, loved her unconditionally, but had no inkling why she had requested her ashes be scattered here. The eulogy had been brief. The Reverend had not known the deceased personally and was not familiar with her family either. Now he shook their hands with a respectful almost apologetic kindness. The bundles of red and pink roses, white tulips and lilies, which had surrounded the polished pine coffin, now lay arranged outside the portico. The droplets of rain splashed on the delicate petals. Umbrellas were raised and the water cannoned off their surfaces with big loud thumps. It was the end of the day and the dark clouds and grey sky foretold of an encroaching autumn evening.

James Bond felt a flicker of warmth on his skin. The last embers of sunshine caught his face, a ray of light streaking through the ash trees, speckled with spots of rain. Maybe there would be a spectacular, technicolor rainbow to accompany her final resting place. Bond smiled at the irony. He recalled an old Humphrey Bogart film that ended something like this. Every now and then, he thought, life really was just like a bad film: a sudden illness and a funeral in the rain.

Bond had pretended to love her many years ago. Her family didn't know it. They didn't know about the Russian either. It was still a classified secret. Someday they would learn why Anita Brookfield wanted her ashes sprinkled on the rose garden beside the chapel. She wanted to lie with the love of her life, Nikolay Volkov, a man she had been forced to give up and who had not been able to live without her.

Bond felt as if a camera was craning forward, capturing his belated sorrow. But Bond, unlike Bogart, had nothing to say. The sun stream flickered and died: a slow dissolve, then cut. Slowly Bond moved away and returned to his car, closing once and for all a distant chapter of his life.


End file.
